FILE - In this March 29, 2011, file photo, former baseball player Barry Bonds arrives for his trial at federal court in San Francisco. A federal appeals court in San Francisco on Friday, Sept. 13, 2013, upheld Bond's obstruction of justice conviction stemming from his 2003 testimony to a grand jury investigating performance enhancing drug use among elite athletes. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)

Photo: Jeff Chiu, Associated Press

FILE - In this March 29, 2011, file photo, former baseball player...

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his Dec. 16, 2011 file photo shows former baseball player Barry Bonds leaving federal court after being sentenced for obstructing justice in a government steroids investigation, in San Francisco.

Photo: Noah Berger, Associated Press

his Dec. 16, 2011 file photo shows former baseball player Barry...

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Former Major League Baseball player Barry Bonds waves as he leaves federal court following a sentencing hearing on December 16, 2011 in San Francisco, California. Bonds was sentenced to 30 days of home confinement and two years probation after a jury found Barry Bonds guilty on one count of obstruction of justice and was a hung jury on three counts of perjury for lying to a grand jury about his use of performance enhancing drugs.

Photo: Justin Sullivan, Getty Images

Former Major League Baseball player Barry Bonds waves as he leaves...

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Barry Bonds waves to a supporter while his attorney Allen Ruby speaks after Bonds was convicted on one count of obstruction of justice at his perjury trial at the Phillip Burton Federal Courthouse in San Francisco, Calif. on Wednesday, April 13, 2011. The jury deadlocked on three other counts.

Photo: Paul Chinn, The Chronicle

Barry Bonds waves to a supporter while his attorney Allen Ruby...

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Former Major League Baseball player Barry Bonds is surrounded by members of the media as he leaves federal court following a sentencing hearing on December 16, 2011 in San Francisco, California. Bonds was sentenced to 30 days of home confinement and two years probation after a jury found Barry Bonds guilty on one count of obstruction of justice and was a hung jury on three counts of perjury for lying to a grand jury about his use of performance enhancing drugs.

Barry Bonds obstructed justice before a federal grand jury when he tried to duck a question about steroid injections with an evasive and irrelevant answer, a federal appeals court ruled Friday in upholding the felony conviction of baseball's home run king.

A jury in San Francisco deadlocked in 2011 on three charges that Bonds committed perjury when he denied, in 2003 grand jury testimony, that he had ever knowingly used steroids or other performance-enhancing drugs.

But jurors convicted him of obstructing the panel's investigation after a prosecutor asked him whether his personal trainer had ever given him injectable drugs. Instead of a yes-or-no answer, he launched into a discourse about his "celebrity" childhood, as the son of ex-ballplayer Bobby Bonds, and his friendship with the trainer, and added, "I just don't get into other people's business."

Bonds appealed his conviction, saying he had testified truthfully. But the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco said factually accurate testimony can be obstructive if it is intended to throw an investigation off course.

"When factually true statements are misleading or evasive, they can prevent the grand jury from obtaining truthful and responsive answers," said Judge Mary Schroeder in the 3-0 ruling.

Bonds' lawyers were not immediately available for comment. They could ask the full appeals court for a rehearing. His sentence of 30 days of house arrest, 250 hours of community service and $4,100 in fines and court costs has been on hold during his appeal.

Bonds issued a statement on his website Friday that read, in part: "I have instructed my attorneys to ask the court and probation officials to permit me to begin serving my full sentence and probation immediately. Meanwhile, I also intend to seek further judicial review of the important legal issues presented by the appeal that was decided today."

Perjury charges against Bonds were dropped after the jury deadlocked. But he was convicted of obstructing justice for his answer about whether Anderson had ever given him drugs he could inject on his own.

Bonds' lawyers argued that the conviction was unfounded because his statements were truthful and because, in later questioning by the prosecutor, he flatly and accurately denied that Anderson had ever given him self-injecting drugs.

No court has ever held such a "truthful, albeit rambling and irrelevant statement" to be a crime, defense lawyers said in their appeal. They said the prosecutors who were interrogating Bonds hadn't given any indication that he was being evasive, or tried to hold him in contempt for refusing to answer, but instead rephrased their questions and got direct answers.

But the appeals court said Bonds' initial answer, even if literally true, was irrelevant to the question and could be considered an attempt to obstruct the investigation.

"The statement served to divert the grand jury's attention from the relevant inquiry of the investigation, which was Anderson's and BALCO's distribution of steroids" and PEDs (performance-enhancing drugs), Schroeder said in the court's decision.

She said the testimony "implied that Bonds did not know whether Anderson distributed steroids and PEDs," despite another former trainer's testimony that Bonds had told him Anderson supplied steroids to ballplayers.

Even if Bonds later answered the same question truthfully, Schroeder said, he was properly convicted of trying to obstruct justice with his earlier testimony.

Anderson and four others pleaded guilty to drug-dealing and related charges in the BALCO probe and served short prison sentences. Anderson also served more than a year in prison for civil contempt for his refusal to testify against Bonds.